In order to create or change a habit, you have to retrain your brain. Your brain, however, actively resists your attempts to retrain it, viewing your interference as not only unwelcome but also potentially dangerous. Fortunately, as far as your brain is concerned, history indicates you’re not very adept at this retraining stuff. Plus you usually give up way too easily and quickly. So your brain doesn’t consider you much of an actual threat.
There’s something to be said for your brain’s point of view. But it’s not good news for you. Your habits can either provide the scaffolding that supports your endeavors or they can completely derail you. They affect every aspect of your life. If you want your life to be a consistently satisfying and meaningful one, you need to be able to reliably manage your habits.
Here are five facts to help you understand habits from your brain’s perspective.
1. Your Brain Has the “Habit” Habit.
- It is primed to turn behaviors into habits, with or without your participation, in order to save energy. Habits make up the bulk of your behavior.
. - Your brain does not share your opinions or judgments about whether your habits are good or bad. As far as your brain is concerned, any habit is a good habit.
. - To succeed: Use your brain’s “habit” habit to your advantage instead of letting it run unfettered.
2. Habitual Behavior Is Unconscious.
- Once a behavior becomes a habit, you no longer have conscious control over it.
. - The fact that you understand the benefit of doing (or not doing) something has absolutely no impact on the part of your brain that runs your habits.
. - To succeed: Communicate with your brain by your actions, not by your thoughts and good intentions. Your brain responds to repetition and persistence.
3. Your Brain Is Predictive Rather than Reactive.
- Your brain is constantly trying to figure out what’s going on, what it means, and what you should do about it.
. - By the time you’re aware you’re about to do something, you have less than two-tenths of a second to veto your brain’s directive.
. - To succeed: Since your brain is always planning ahead, you have to plan ahead, too.
4. Habits are More than Behaviors.
- Habits consist of three parts: a cue or trigger, a routine (the actual behavior), and a reward. This is known as the habit loop.
. - Your brain is motivated to move you toward anything it finds rewarding.
. - To succeed: Accept, understand, and use your brain’s reward system.
5. Your Brain Is Profoundly Averse to Change.
- Your brain uses its considerable processing power and speed to maintain the status quo.
. - To change the status quo, you must have a very compelling why (10 on a scale of 1-10).
. - To succeed: Identify your desired outcome, not just your objective! (How is your status quo going to change once you successfully create or modify a particular habit?)
The good news is that once you’ve created a positive new habit or changed an existing negative one, your brain will dedicate itself to maintaining your new status quo just as zealously as it did the old one.
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